However, good things come to those who wait…Īn amiable waster, Rudolf Rassendyll promises his sister-in-law that he will finally make something of his life and join the diplomatic service.

That was a full year ago, which gives you some idea of how easily I’m distracted where books are concerned. Like Scaramouche, this was something that I finally decided to try when I saw that Helen had been reading it (I have to thank Helen for a lot of swashbuckling goodness). It’s a deliciously fast-paced tale of disguise, secret identities, wicked plots, noble heroes and dastardly villains. Silva from Dorothy & Jack, Xmas 1895’), this wonderful romp hasn’t aged nearly as much as you might expect. First published in 1894 (my copy was given to ‘Gladys W.

This time the book in question is a much-loved classic which I should really have read years ago. He died in 1933 at age 70.It’s high time for another swashbuckler, as a busy period looms at work. Hope was knighted in 1918 and bought a country estate at Tadworth in Surrey, where he spent the rest of his life. The marriage produced two sons and a daughter. On one of them he met an American woman named Elizabeth Somerville Sheldon, and they married in 1903. He first toured the US in 1897, and made several subsequent trips there. In 1898 Hope wrote a sequel of sorts, 'Rupert of Hentzau', using the villainous character of 'Zenda'. 'Zenda' is generally credited as the first-and the best-of what came to be known as 'Ruritanian' novels, stories set in a small fictional European principality involving intrigue, double-crossing, power grabs and forbidden romance at the royal court ( Richard Harding Davis, among others, took up that particular genre with his 'Graustark' series), and 'Zenda' has been made into film and television productions at least ten times. He published two successful novels in 1894-'The Dolly Dialogues', which was fairly successful but is little remembered today, and the now-classic 'The Prisoner of Zenda'. When it got to the point where he had to choose between his law practice and writing, he chose writing. It became a hit, coincidentally at the same time his law practice began to take off. When he couldn't find a publisher for his first novel, he published it himself. He set up his own practice, but clients were few and far between, and he spent the periods in between cases by writing novels.

He studied to become a lawyer, and was admitted to the bar in 1887. He was educated at Marlborough School and Baliol College, Oxford, obtaining an M.A. Johns Foundation School for the Sons of Poor Clergy. British novelist/playwright Anthony Hope was born Anthony Hope Hawkins on, in London.

Anthony hope novel the prisoner of